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New York Mayor de Blasio Demands A Federal Bailout For Puerto Rico
While Greece may have kicked the can for the time being by imposing a third bailout whose terms are sure to led to the terminal collapse of the Greek economy (which has already moved on to barter), and lead to yet another in the immediate future, a bailout which even the IMF now openly opposes demanding a concrete debt haircut before it participates with more funds, the insolvency soap opera is about to jump the Atlantic to Puerto Rico where a default is now just 48 hours away.
As a reminder, August 1 is the due date for Puerto Rico's public agencies to make close to $200 million in bond payments. Next month, the commonwealth is on the hook for $635 million in payments. Over the next 12 months, it has to cover over $5 billion in bond payments.
Last month, Puerto Rico Governor Alejandro Garcia Padilla announced that the commonwealth was no longer capable of making payments on its $72 billion dollars in public debt. Not long after his declaration, Puerto Rico's Power Authority narrowly avoided default with a last-minute $128 million bridge loan so it could cover a $415 million payment.
As further reported before, just like in the Greek case, the biggest immediate losers would be the island's creditors: a consortium of 34 hedge funds and bondholders called on the Puerto Rican government to avoid a $72 billion default by boosting taxes, selling off public properties and cutting government spending as well as reducing its support for public education. They stopped short of suggesting a Greek "solution" where sovereign assets are held in escrow for the benefit of creditors.
The creditors cited a report they had commissioned that was drafted by three former International Monetary Fund economists who faulted Puerto Rico for boosting spending on education by $1.4 billion over the last 10 years even though enrollment had dropped by 25 percent.
But while the Puerto Rican creditors' bargaining power on the island is to put it mildly, negligible, especially after the budget director made the imminent default into a crusade of poor versus rich, saying he won’t redirect cash from its operating budget to make debt payments, an unexpected supporter has emerged thousands of miles from the beleaguered island: New York's socialist mayor Bill DeBlasio.
As CBS reports "New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio demanded President Obama and Congress immediately come to the island's fiscal rescue."
"It's the federal government's obligation to act, because they can't stand idly by and watch Puerto Rico fail," de Blasio told a crowd of hundreds of Puerto Rico boosters gathered on the steps of City Hall.
New York City Council Speaker Melissa Mark-Viverito characterized the hedge funds that hold much of the commonwealth's outstanding debt as "vultures that are eating off the misery of Puerto Rico" because the funds want cuts in Puerto Rico's spending, including for public education.
In other words, socialists are hoping to show those "evil vulture funds" by... paying them off?
The "uses of funds" confusion wasn't limited to just the two: joining de Blasio and Mark-Viverito on the steps of City Hall were dozens of other elected officials, including City Comptroller Scott Stringer and Public Advocate Letitia James as well as several of New York City's top labor leaders. Similar high-profile protests were held in Washington, D.C., and Orlando, Florida.
Organizers of the nationwide event, with an eye toward 2016, emphasized that millions of Puerto Rican voters in the U.S. were watching how Washington is responding to the crisis.
Several speakers referenced Puerto Rico's depression-like economic conditions in rejecting calls for additional austerity as a way to keep bondholders current. Today, 45 percent of the island's residents live in poverty, and just 43 percent of its potential labor force is working. The desperate economic conditions have also sparked a mass exodus of young people who have left in pursuit of off-island job opportunities.
De Blasio and the coalition of Puerto Rico supporters used the demonstration to announce a five-point federal rescue agenda for Puerto Rico that includes:
- Calling on President Obama to create a federal investment plan that "grows the economy with good paying jobs" with a focus on the health care and clean energy sectors. The action agenda also calls for the clean up of Puerto Rican islands that were contaminated by years of Pentagon target practice and weapons testing.
- Rolling back federal regulations like the Jones Act, which requires that all maritime trade cargo between Puerto Rico and the U.S. mainland be carried on U.S.-flagged commercial vessels. Island boosters want Congress to repeal the act saying it hurts island consumers and businesses by raising shipping costs.
- Calling on Congress to pass legislation to grant Puerto Rico a Chapter 9 bankruptcy option to give the commonwealth the kind of flexibility Detroit had in reorganizing its finances.
- Requesting that President Obama convene his Working Group on Financial Markets to bring all of Puerto Rico's public debt stakeholders together to negotiate a "fair" debt repayment plan as well as explore a loan from the Federal Reserve.
- Asking both President Obama and Congress to "oppose severe austerity and wage reduction proposals" that would target "poor and working families."
One wonders just how much of this sudden concern for the troubled island is a geniune socialist concern for one's fellow suffering man, and how much is pandering to potential Puerto Rican voters of which NYC has an abundance.
One thing, however, is certain: in the end the creditors will win, and US taxpayers will somehow end up on the hook yet again, because if it hasn't been made abundantly clear over the past 7 years, that's the modus operandi of the New Normal.
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Write'em a check with NYC funds Bill.....
Out of the hookers & blow fund? Nah, maybe a public employees pension that hasn't been completely raided...
I've been to PR. Some nice spots surrounded by filth. Literally garbage everywhere. It's like these people don't even care to find a garbage can.
Hah ha ha ha ha ha ha
Socialism with somebody else's money.
Asshole
We have some sand and salt water to sell.
Buy NOW before our exclusive supply runs out!
... " ... default is now just 48 hours away." ...
... Dios mío, Puerto Rico, en cuarenta y ocho horas sería Puerto Pobre ...
He demanded that other people cough up money to help someone else and himself?
His name doesn't sound Jewish, what gives?
pods
Is this really to bailout Puerto Rico? Or holders of PR debt?
Hmmm....
Me thinks the NYC pension fund is heavily invested in PR bonds.
Puerto Ricans are the Greeks of the Caribbean. Maybe they can hold a parade for them to rape...err...I mean raise a few billion dollars.
The entire Carribean is Greek. Most of the people would rather not work and live in filth and poverty despite having beautiful islands and beaches. It's a shame
"consortium of 34 hedge funds and bondholders"
They new the risks, let em eat it, maybe next time they will be a little more conservative.
No Worries, Puerto Rico and all its inhabitants are welcome in NYC. Otherwise, they be racist!
It's to bailout voters in NYC.
BTW his real name is Warren Wilhelm.
BINGO! Bailout debt holders who never should have lended money to ZPR when they were so far in debt already. Fuck them, let them lose every dime they used to buy PR debt!
Can't wait for your exact words to be used in the context of U.S. Treasurys at some point in the future.
Thankfully Bill has stepped up to take control of the situation. I was getting worried about PR! /sarc
NY should bailout PR
Agree completely. It's good to have a real heavyweight in a situation like this. Sort of like when they send in John Kerry to a high level negotiation. You instantly breathe a little easier knowing everything is going to be OK.
Let me just add the /sarc tag for you! Just for the newcomer's sanity sake.
No. It's all the same money. Ours.
Bail out the cockroaches? No way Jose! Or Willhelm! Break out the Raid!
That is common in poor Caribbean countries.
PR Pub FinCorp has an 08/01 payment coming due.
Bonds trading in the teens.
Here we go!!!
He is panicking, knowing half of Puerto Rico will show up in their favorite American city, New York, and they don't even need a visa!
I just hope they all show up at the same time.
I thougth half of Puerto Rico was already IN NYC?
pods
I like to be in America, okay by me in America. Every thing's free in America, for a small fee in America! Girl: I like the city of San Juan. Boy: I know a boat you can get on. Girl: Hundreds of flowers in full bloom. Boy: Hundreds of people in each room! Automobile in America, chromium steel in America. Wire spoke wheel in America, very big deal in America! Girl: I'll drive a Buick though San Juan. Boy: If there's a road you can drive one. Girl: I'll give my cousins a free ride. Boy: How you fit all of them inside? I like the storys in America, comfort is your's in America. Knobs on the doors in America, wall to wall floors in America! Girl: I'll bring a T.V. to San Juan. Boy: if there's a current to turn on. Girl: Everyone there will give big cheer. Boy: Everyone there will have moved here! Immigrant goes to America, many hellos in America. Nobody knows in America, Puerto Rico's in America! Girl: When I will go back to San Juan. Boy: When will you shut up and get one? Girl: I'll give them new washing machine. Boy: What have they got there to keep clean?
I think he meant half of the half that's left. The remaining quarter will be moving to South Florida.
Exactly my thoughts. Let's just sit back and wait for the hilarity to ensue. I'll make the popcorn!
Shit, if Puerto Rico would agree to cancel the annual NYC Puerto Rican Day Parade, I bet rich New Yorkers would donate the funds to settle that debt. . .
Dear Bill,
My family, like many others is trying to keep our heads above water during this, um, "economic recovery". I live on the west coast and have never been to Puerto Rico. Really have no desire to go there. Can you tell me why my tax dollars should go to bail out a quasi country / colony or whatever you want to call it? Let them figure it out for themselves.
Sincerely,
Rubi
Heartless creep.
Have you no pity for those poor hedgefund managers?
Yes, Bolshevik Bill is very keen to have irresponsible PR "saved" by the Federal Government. Particularly as he knows next up will be other Socialist crap holes like Chicago and of course New York City. All of which are being bankrupted by irresponsible Leftist politicians and their friendly Public Employee Parasites (PEPs). PEPs and their gravy train pensions must be maintained at all costs, so yes - just print up the money while the presses are hot!
By the way, what did Puerto Rico do with the $72 BILLION that they owe?
What do they have to show for it?
Did they invest it?
They bought a shit ton of flags to hang around their rearview mirrors.
J-Lo albums.
Spiderman towels
pandering politician is pandering...
Another blurry Bruce Jenner and friends click-bait picture.
It's ironic that an entire industry exists around offering women of European descent the curves and the bodily features of southern women.
The return on investment is obviously worth it to those women.
What is a southern woman?
I know skin lightening is a big deal in Indonesia, India, (China?)...
The cosmetics industry generates its profits by promoting feelings of insecurity and inadequacy among women. It holds up a nearly impossible ideal to young women through the media. This makes women question their own appearances, and incites them to go buy various products and services through which they can try to "reach" that ideal. This dynamic occurs globally; it's essentially a business model.
An important distinction to make in this, however, is that women of color are constantly being told that they are 2nd rate compared to Western women (a concept known as racial hierarchy, which is derived from the tenets of White Supremacy and the policies of South Africa's apartheid regime). White women, by contrast, have an entire media apparatus constantly placing them on a racist pedestal at the expense of women of color.
Despite this total lack of symmetry and equal treatment, Western women seem to be the most insecure in today's age. This is reflected in the fact that they're the primary customers of this cosmetics industry. Think about that for a moment.
funny - your comment seems to presuppose that women don't have agency - don't have the capacity to make rational decisions based on their own interests.
In fact, your assessment is both patronizing and paternalistic.
Has it ever been suggested to you that you might be a bit of a cunt?
Looks like I struck the capitalist and the white nationalist nerve all at once.
Triumphalism about your supposed supremacy - the civilised term for it is racism. My priorities are with the needs of the underprivileged, and not the sensitivities of the privileged.
Dude. You live in a western nation. You ARE privilidged. There are 6 billion people on the planet who would give everything they have to get what you have. Many of them would simply take it. While you rail on and on about how the 'privleged' should be robbed to give to the 'unprivleged', you are forgetting that there are billions of people who think the same thing about YOU. Like the so called intellectuals of the USSR, you are too stupid to realize that if your ideas are put into effect, it will be your destruction. FOAD.
Eiric, have you been tardy for your testosterone treatments again? Are they mistakingly giving you estrogen? Stay away from that soybean stuff, it has a tendency to mimic estrogen.
"Southern women"?
Like the Dallas Cheerleaders?
European women don't have curves?
Dunno if that's primarily some sort of racism or primarily stupidity on your part.
Just another example of progressive liberal socialist lunatics running out of other peoples money. This has been happening every time for decades, none of the leftist idiots ever learns. They just think liberalism has not been done enough.
The problem is that they keep getting the money. Why should they stop a good thing? It's just the productive, working, people who get screwed by this. Their voters keep winning.
It worked as long as everybody believed they would just make moar money in years ahead to pay for it
And their houses would always appreciate in value.
That's all over now
One can only hope it's all over.
And hope that property taxes don't skyrocket since prices aren't appreciating and the gubmint wants a never ending, expanding, quantity of your money.
So the proposed solution to failed socialism is to kick the can up a level of government for some more responsible redistribution and bankruptcy protections? Once again the root of the problem is the desires of the free shit army and the power hungry politicians willing to promise anything for votes.
how about a bailout for NY? there are homeless people bathing in fountains
Hopefully they'll clean/scrub the fountains while they're in there. Should people be dropping off free detergent and scrub brushes?
"Lenny, you have just saved the lives of millions of registered voters"
lol.
Just looking out for his constiturnts. What percent of his voters were Puerto Rican?
Now if he could convince Blankfein to support the bailout, Puerto Rico would have been bailed yesterday.
Hes just pimping the pimp vote.
Puerto Rico is worth more broke than bailed out.
Looks like the fund managers in NYC are putting their boy out there to get themselves paid. Good work, Bill.
Yep, a real man of the people.
Yeah, I was gonna say. DeBlasio and the bond insurers both on the same page. To paraphrase the Wicked Witch: what a fucking world, oh what a fucking world.
More debt=coming to the rescue. Just ask Greece!
Why is he even talking about this? He has nothing to do with Puerto Rico. Talk about pandering to your constituency.He's turning out to be a really bad mayor.
Yeah, because he started out so well.
Oh pleeeeeeeezzzzzzz.
DeBlasio has has about 50.05 gigga reasons to "DEMAND" that the federal government (Obama/Hillary) bail out PR. First there is the 10 million or so Puerto Ricans living in New York - soon to become 50 when another 40 million flee the island to come to New York - as someone previously pointed out. Then we have the $50 billion or so that Puerto Rico owes Llouyd Blankfein for having done "God's work" down there.
Besides look how Christie rose in the polls when he went to Obama for Sandy aid. However Mr BridgeGate said please while deBlasio is "DEMANDING" it.
Who does he think he is? DEMANDING a bailout!!!!
Why doesn't he go demand that Putin bail out Puerto Rico. Putin would probably be glad to pay. Then he could put a naval base there. We could go farther with this approach and have the Ayatollahs bail out PR. They would like a naval base on PR and have the cash from the recent sanctions release. Fine with me as long as they fly their nukes up John Kerry's ..... For that matter, Fidel and Raoul could do the bailout.
Oh, just picture it...Upper West Side progressive libtards being mugged daily by the 40 million new Puerto Riquenos in their beloved shit-hole of a city.
Can I call them racists when they start complaining about it? Oh please, oh please!
Ask yourself . . . what would the Germans do?
Drink a gallon of (really good) beer and have a weinerschetzel.
Then when good and drunk, sing the Horst Wessel song, rape the women and send the innocents to the ovens after selling the children to Bohemian Grove attendees and British politicians
Wasn't that the entertainment from the last Deutche Bank holiday party?
Cool.
Are they selling tickets to get in?
ZH member discount?
Yes, please bail out puerto rico's investors rather than let them default. JFC.
everything is free in America
nothing is free in America
West Side Story
"Calling on President Obama to create."
The only thing I've witnessed of his creativity is abundant misery.
Oh, there's lies too.
these leftist commie motherfuckers are always calling on the President of the US to whip laws, money, and other shit up out of thin air instead of following the process and rule of law like you're supposed to... they're a bunch of inept numbskull control freaks who whipsaw from one bad decision to the next and then demand immediate relief from their bald faced stupidity... cronies and gangsters, all of them, the worst kind to be sitting in any public seat that you can imagine...
I can't wait for both US coasts to fall in the goddamned oceans and drown once and for all...
Putin can come in and bail them out and put missiles on Puerto Rico. Great idea.
After all, if USA can put missiles on Russia' border why not vice versa?
Well seeing as PR is a Commonwealth and all born in PR are US citizens - that may be a reason.
Besides Putin is too busy trying to keep Russia afloat.
Putin takes Franklin's advice. Neither a borrower or a lender be.
I find it helps to sing-along with the elevator music. de Blasio is de whacko but he'll probably get a sympathetic ear with the libs. Obama won't miss a chance to spend more to insure the future enslavement of the 99%'ers.
Comrade DeBlazio is just fishing for the Rican vote. That fucker can't crash and burn fast enough!
Comrade DeBlazio is just fishing for the Rican vote. That fucker can't crash and burn fast enough!
You can say THAT again!
In other words, socialists are hoping to show those "evil vulture funds" by... paying them off?
But that's the only way to KEEP THE MONEY FLOWING! Who likes having creditors with a brain in their head, anyway? Replace the evil capitalists with pliable, idiotic politicians who can be bought with just a portion of the taxpayer money they're lending you (i.e. kickbacks) and ALL IS WELL!!!
Deblowsio is just another demented progressive, who loaths this country as founded.
I suggest he and the rest of the free shit asshole army move to P.Rico take it over and fix it on their own dime!
Nah, that would not work they would starve without someone else to leach off of.
Nah, that would not work they would starve without someone else to leach off of.
Works for me!!
Why, I do believe the island of Puerto Rico needs Infrastructure. They need shovel ready jobs. That'll fix it.
What a fucking idiot this De Blasio turd is. Why should I, or any other American have to pay a dime to bail out the people who loaned Puerto Rico the money that they just created out of thin air?
Think there are any PR in NY that vote straight donkey-ass?
Where is Gerald Ford when we really need him?
Why, so PR can go back into debt?
Just give the addict free needles.
Typical marxist solution.
Congress has been a marxist tool since 1913.
I can support repeal of this Jones Act.
Puerto Ricans pay Zero Federal Income taxes. If they want a bail out , then have them pay taxes like everyone else
There is no federal tax on no income.
Adding insult to injury, last time I checked, Peurto Rico was the #1 recipient per capita of .gov subsidies and was the greatest perpetrator of fraudulent claiming of said subsidies. I would be willing to help by hiring a gorgeous young Peutro Rican girl as a "house servant". Otherwise..........fuck off PR.
Next it will be a crowd of the independent state of Detroit voters, then Chicago,
then ad nauseum infinitinitum
Sure, Bill. The US can bail them out. After all, we only have a national debt of 18 trillion and 108 trillion in unfunded liabilities. Plenty of pretend money to go around.
After the Little Napoleon, I could not fathom NYers electing a derelict, dog turd in the street like DeLenin.
I was wrong.
who will bail out NY?
Give Perto Rico INDEPENDENCE.
STOP THEIR FREELOADING on US taxpayers.
Or give them to Venezuela or Cuba or Haiti ... just get them the fu.k off the U.S. dole!!!
Fine... only if this fucking communist completely drains his government pension and health benefits as a first installment.
Get your thievin' greasy hands off of my wallet, bitch.
All your monies are Mine, NYC! Hahahhahaha!
So says the "mayor" who can't get out of bed on time.
De(b)Lazy-o
Bill is trying to set precedent for when NYC needs a bailout in a couple years.
Bill is a fucking Bolshevik.
All he needs is some fucking rope.
(for tying yup loose ends, of course...)
If they don't prosecute crimes on Wall Street, I hope NY turns itself into a crime ridden shithole reminiscent of the 1970s, with leather jacket Puerto Rican thugs and every other ejection of chaos these people in finance have wraught.
It deserves to end up right on the side walk where they work.
Come to New York, Puerto Rico!
All you have to do is watch Bloomberg and CNBC to find out what a land of Milk and Honey it is.
Bill has a former lesbian black wife and mulatto children.
PRs were a major factor in the decline of NYC. They've been citizens since 1917 been getting all of our tax $$$ subsidies like Food Stamps, and all the rest of the goodies.
They are, like all people of color: ANTI-WHITE and HARD LEFT.
Just another knife in the back of White America.
Exodus from Puerto Rico could upend FL vote
Same story all over again. In Canada they had a Ugandan immigrant giving a particularly virulent form of AIDS to white canadian women, and what a LONG list it was. Then in Idaho another African, a college student, gave AIDS to a shitload of White co-eds. The MEDIA has taught white women that black males are the BEST. While white males are the butt of jokes and ridicule, if they are of the J-Tribe they too are depicted as god-like, like the black.
“Man Arrested” (I. E. Nigerian Asylum Seeker) In ICELAND For Giving Women HIV
Yeah, Bill's a Coal Driller. And drilling a Lesbo! How exciting is that?
Does NYC have Puerto Rican bonds in their pension funds?
I am sure. Lots of funds pepper their portfollios with nice high yeilding Puerto Rican bonds.
Once the defaults start happening we will start to see CONTAGION!! haha. Then NYC will need to bail out these funds, and NYC will need a bailout, etc.
Don't think that just because you changed your avatar and are now wearing a tux we didn't notice Joe. You can't trick us into believing you won't belong in the same FEMA camp.
First mover advantage applies inside the FEMA camps as well I reckon, so I hope to be able to get in on the early side.
The LAPD used to have a term of art... Puerto Rican Special.
It meant no license, no insurance, and no habla ingles.
Fuck you in the ass, de Blasio.
Maybe Deblahsio should appeal to the IMF.
My new name is Vladimir Ilyich DeBlasio! I demand the Running Dog Capitalists fund Puerto Rico, or I may lose support with the spics I am trying to impress.
Bill: Leonard, you are my closet pal. I gotta get all these fucking niggers, wops, spics and every other kind of scum on my side so I can build Political Power!"
Leonard: "You mean, you don't actually care about these people?"
Bill: "Fuck no! I'd just as soon shove them in a wood chipper--after I got their votes! Damn! I even married that Negress! You know how bad black pussy smells? Shit, I have done my part for the Revolution. My fuckin' kids look like that homo Obama! Time for some payback into my offshore account!"
Seems unavoidable to me...we suggested the E.U. bail out Greece...now we must walk the walk...anyway, what's a hundred bill'
between friends !
So, he is also Governor of PR?
Wow.
Thought you could not hold two offices like that...
I am all for the mayor giving his entire salary to Puerto Rico.
Otherwise, the 'Sharks' really did beat the 'Jets' in West Side Story...
DC TO NY: "DROP DEAD"
Puerto Rico is just the start.
Soon 20% of the US cities will need a bailout.
If the FED's set a precedent for bailing out all the bankrupt cities and states in the US, the FED's will start to lose their credit rating when our creditors see the writing on the wall that it will never stop. (even though we can print the reserve currency) The decission to bail out may be the trigger to unwind this whole fiat ponzi scheme.
Why not?
Clinton pardoned the Puerto Rican mad bombers from the 70's and 80's.
Soon:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1qoq9jIjpNM
Fuck deblasio, didn't think it was possible to find a worse mayor for NYC than bloomturd.
Every person, city, state and country that cannot support itself should fail/die. Wake the fuck up. Debt based system is unsustainable, it was created to be unsustainable. Why help other countries when we can barely support and help ourselves. Why police the world instead of our own borders? These are the demands you should be making you backward cunt.
The entire system is fucked from Oblamo to deblowhole. I hope some biochemist creates something to annihilate 90% of earths population. That way survivors would have a chance to take the fucking power back from these sewer rat cunts.
Bullshit DeBlasio and party. If the heduge funds were "vultures" as you state - then why not just starve the beast instead of paying the bills when due? You're such fucking hypocrites - you make me sick.
Ask John Wayne Bobbitt how he feels about PR women... Ouchie! Ouchie! Oh well thanks for the miracle of microsurgery. By the way,wakes you up in the morning way better than coffee!!! Five bucks says they change the law on PR Bankruptcy.... I keep hearing the same thing: Venezuela,Greece,Puerto Rico. Great women,great climate,shame about the economy.Take the pain like ICELAND.Get it over with and jail a few bankers.The one thing the white collar types hate is being put in handcuffs. ONCE THEY START MISSING THEIR HOOKERS AND BLOW THEY WILL START SINGING LIKE CANARIES.THE ITALIANS USED DETENTION WELL AGAINST THE MOB.ONCE THEY START MISSING THEIR PASTA AND THEIR MAMAS AND OMERTA GOES DOWN THE GURGLER...
NYC doesn't need more PR's.
No, no more bailouts. No more rescues. From now on, we need to play by the rules of reality. If you are bankrupt, SAY SO. Admit it, spit it out, fess up...no more word-games and accounting tricks. It's past time for us ALL to see the economy we've created for what it IS, not what we wish it would be. Puerto Rico needs to lay all FACTS on the table, and if those facts don't add up, default and get it over with. This is the math, the reality, and we cannot pay. Period. Let the chips fall where they may, and injure whoever doesn't get out of the way.
We can either take the medicine now, or we can take it later. But it will probably work better if we do it early, and on our own terms, rather than having it forced down in a crisis. Unwinding this tangled debt-system will be painful for almost everyone, and default is the only path out, as the math simply doesn't allow for repayment. But most folks would be balanced between their losses (through the defaults of others) and their gains (their own default on THEIR obligations.)
You see, losing the pension hurts so much because you still have to pay out on all your own debts. It would sting a lot less if you saw a balance in your own outgoing expenses. It would be easier for you to reset your budget to a less "spendy" setting and get back to business. And THAT is the whole point of wiping out debt. To restore proper function to an unbalanced system.
All these places that are facing unpayable pension obligations would be wise to consider offering trade-offs to these folks...take a X-percent cut in the pension, in return, we knock it off your property or income taxes. We "comp" you on all the annoying nuisance fees and charges, whatever...If you are telling someone that you are going to cut their income, it goes over a lot better if you also tell them how you will be cutting their expenses.
Yeah, we CAN'T pay all these people everything they were promised. But we're going to have to give up some of what we took from them too. It isn't the pensioners fault that his money was 'spent' on other things, and that, to replace it, his leaders took out a loan from 100,000 of his fellow citizens (that's what a muni-bond IS..)...a loan that basically obligates him to pay THEIR pensions at the expense of his own when it comes time to collect...What kind of stupid, mindless, ASININE system IS this? If these places could only spend what they could collect in taxes they ALL be able to pay their own pensioners! They'd save the hundreds of billions in fees and commissions they pay to Wall Street to shuffle all this paper around the fucking country in an attempt to stay 2 steps ahead of the Reckoning. And we wouldn't be faced with the awful spectacle of Americans scavenging the carcasses of their neighbors in a desperate attempt to survive.
Someone from the financial industry facilitated this huge intertwining of everyone's interests to this point. AND they made a fortune doing it by placing themselves right in the middle, and continue to reap rewards as money flows in AND out. It allowed local elected idiots to 'spend' money they didn't have, and didn't have the balls to try and collect, and then to stick everyone with the bill. It has created a generation of selfish, entitled people who think they have a RIGHT to an income-stream generated by others, regardless of any hardships those others may have in supporting them.
If this nonsense isn't unwound in an orderly fashion (still possible..) it WILL be unwound by forces beyond our control.
Sorry for the rant. I'm just in a 'mood'...
"If this nonsense isn't unwound in an orderly fashion (still possible..)"
Yeah,
That's some kind of mood, alright. I suppose a mental health specialist might have a more descriptive clinical term applicable to such flights of fancy.
It might indeed qualify as delusional thinking...but I believe that it is never over till it's over. Until then, all is possible, and sometimes we are surprised by some unexpected turn of events.
ALL hope is delusion. But sometimes it helps to psyche ourselves up a little before battle.
Let de Blasio, the admitted communist, propose a special tax on the residents of NYC to bail out Peurto Rico. He's just a friggin' mayor.
Boy.
It's a good thing nobody defaults anymore, otherwise there might be some problems in the insurance industry.
Bernie Sanders for president, Bill De Blasio for Veep, Nicolás Maduro as economic advisor.
How about the not-dead-as-yet ever popular Raul Castro for Sec. of State.
He's the Castro feller everyone likes.
Incompetent civil servant making demands...
$72 billion dollars in public debt? WTF! Tell me, when they got 20 billion in the hole, didn't that signal trouble and get them to stop borrowing?
Go Shopping America. "Go into debt" If anyone had any contact with financial institutions during The Great Credit Extension, or even a clerk at a Macy's Store, credit was not just being offered, it was being insisted upon. The deal of 20% with the application, 0% interest for 1 year, and a credit limit to The Moon, it just seemed like the right thing to do. It was a trap. We see that now. We are at war and debt is the weapon. And the enemy is now telling us how awfully unfortunate we are that there is nothing left to do but foreclose, Debt for Nature. Push the citizens into the sea.
I support an independent Puerto Rico.
Fuck DiBlasio and the rest of that nit-wit group of pandering politicians. If they were bondholders that loaned money in good faith they wouldn't be singing that tune....
He should change the spelling of his name to DeLOUSIO
Worst mayor since Beam
Even that stiff Dinkins was a better mayor
De Blasio and the rest are whoring for the rich Oligarchs.
Oligarchs eat s*** and die!
The taxpayers need to bail out Puerto Rico because they didn't have enough debt. If Puerto Rico could borrow just a little more money their progressive utopia would be sustainable.
I don't know, maybe it's me but I feel like 90% of the US population is living in fantasyland. Spend spend, kick the can, it seems they can't think more than 2 steps ahead, and you try to reason with them and they come up with higher min wage, green tech and more education. Well guess what, self serve computers will replace the cashiers at McDonalds., only the 1% can afford green tech, so it doesn't matter if we proudce a lot of solar panels, no one can afford to by them, how do you make any money. The education system is not meant to educate anyone, just make you a slave of the state. I don't see any way out of this if most of the people don't even think there is a problem.
It's back to the Dinkins '80s for Fun City. Walking down Broadway @ 86th two days ago, a total piece of shit street urchin walks by me and slams me in the left arm. Of course if I gave him what he was asking for I'd be that poor excuse for a mayor's poster boy for white rage. Fuck NYC. The day I never see it again can't come soon enough.
They have repeatedly sold this junk grade debt to the pension funds in the USA.This is outright fraud to
categorize this as low risk,investment grade when it is the worst sort of Ponzi.Once PR gets the bankruptcy
free pass from DC,those PR Bonds sittting in pension portofolios will be worth pennies on the dollar,and any
loans using them as collateral will be exposed to a large margin call.Oh and ever wonder why Big Pharma
used Puerto Rico as a test area for the original contraceptive pill? Any kids with three heads and there
would've been class action litigation on the mainland...Make a bet there was a tort limit on any PR citizens
(poor latina women) who signed a waiver they probably did not understand,shielding Big Pharma,because the
women (Catholic country) were so desperate for a reliable method of birth control. Kinda sucks....
Having been born and raised in PR (and having escaped as soon as I was an adult), I find the comparisons to Greece to be spot on for reasons much different than those mentioned here.
Puerto Rico was a port of trade, similar to Hong Kong, thru much of Spain's occupation. After the Spanish- American war and the occupation by the US, Puerto Rico spent 50 years as a purely agricultural exporter (being a tropical island does have agricultural advantages). In 1952 US tax law was changed in order to transform PR from an agricultural economy to an industrial economy. The US tax laws changed again in the 1990's which shut down PR's tax advantages and with it the ability to attract manufacturers.
The average income in the island is $20k per anum. Teachers typically make between $12k-$20k a year. Cost of living is very high, since most products, not including some agricultural products, are imported. unemployment is worst than any other state.
The basic problem in PR, like in Greece, is the currency. Please a bit of patience while I explain. The value of the currency in a country, as compared to any other currency, should reflect the productive value of the people in the country and the value of it's exports. A country with high value exports and a trade surplus would naturally have a stronger currency. This would make their exports more expensive (reflecting their higher value) and their imports cheaper (eventually balancing the trade imbalance).
PR uses the US dollar. But PR imports almost everything and has a massive trade deficit. Those two factors can not coexist. Since PR products (including the labor) are priced in US dollars, they are kept artificially expensive relative to products in Central and South America. Add to that the costs of US labor laws and tax compliance (both artificial constructs) and the economy has been screwed for decades.
Because the low wages and high costs of living, the most productive puerto ricans leave the island along with the riff-raff (I would venture to say at a higher rate). Anyone with an education/productive skill leaves the island for the US were costs of living are lower and salaries much higher. This has been going on for decades and has resulted in a massive drain of productivity in the island (a "brain drain").
The answer would be for PR to become independent of the US, at least when it comes to currency. I understand, like most ZHers that currency is not money. I am solely speaking of currency at this point. The ability to devalue your currency to reduce your trade imbalance is key for the recovery of the island as it is for Greece's recovery. With a lower value currency and freedom from US labor and tax laws, PR's exports would be much cheaper than those of Central and South America. This would provide an influx of foreign currency (mainly dollars) and manufacturing facilities. The more you export (or sell any product) the more capital will be available to invest in the production of that product.
Until PR becomes independent and/or stops using the US dollar, it will remain tied to the US monetary cycles while unable to balance its trade. In one word a poor shit hole (well, three words)
New York is over. DeBlasio cannot even keep the subways running or the homelss off of the streets. He is totally incompetent.
Yet now he wants to bail out PR ? Could only be real in a movie or 1960 Soviet, Bolshevik Russia.
The fraudulet flow of Welfare and Medicare money from NYC to PR is astounding. Social Security checks are flwoing to PR for people long dead who moved back to PR but never reported to SS.
It truly is insane.
Give Puerto Rico Indepence and let them go the way of Haiti.
Enough already!